The failure of Cañon City School District's ballot issues, 3B and 3C, came to a blow to Kyle Horne, chairman of the Committee to Support Cañon City Education, following Tuesday's election.

Issue 3B, a $1.35 million mill levy override, lost by 159 votes, and Issue 3C, a $5.45 million bond, lost by 529 votes. The funds would have stayed in Cañon City schools and would have been used for building repair and maintenance, textbooks and technology, school security and vocational and advanced placement offerings.

"Obviously, we are disappointed," Horne said. "We felt that we made a good argument for why these two issues needed to pass, and we tried to make sure everyone understood that this was basically putting our kids on a level playing field with those in the rest of the state."

He said the voters in the community had a different point of view.

"It was close, but I guess we'll have to keep playing from behind," he said. "I don't know if we'll ever be able to close the gap."

Horne said the community at some point will have to decide that education is important and that putting students in a position to succeed is important.

"Right now, for financial reasons they decided now was not the time, which is extremely disappointing," he said.

The district is one of the lowest-funded districts in the state and one of the few who does not receive financial support from the local community. Student funding is $400 less, per student, today than it was four years ago and more than $3 million has been cut from the school district's budget during the past five years. The district has taken a 12 percent cut since 2009, but the bills and the needs haven't decreased.

Horne said two-thirds of the state's school districts receive mill levy overrides. Cañon City does not. Cañon City School District is the second lowest funded in the state, Horne said, the only one lower receives additional federal funding, as well as a mill levy override.

Superintendent Dr. Robin Gooldy said the district went into the campaign knowing it would be a challenge to pass both issues.

"This is not a tax-friendly environment," he said. "I think we were optimistic, but we were realistic at the same time and knew that it would be tough to get them passed."

Gooldy said the needs identified during the campaign haven't gone away.

"The textbooks, the technology, replacing teachers, trying to be competitive salary-wise, all of those needs are still there, plus the upkeep of the buildings," he said. "We'll probably have to go back to some of the strategies that were recommended by the board committee from a year ago and look at some of those decisions that I don't think people really want to go to."

Horne said the issue affects not only students, but the local community as a whole.

"The idea was to invest in your local community," he said. "One of the biggest ways to do that is through education."

He said from a business standpoint, he wonders how to convince families to move to the area, to bring businesses here and work here knowing that funding their children and their education is not a priority.

"As a community, at some point, we're going to have to make that a priority or the cycle is going to continue," he said. "It is time to have a DOC employee not build a house in Pueblo West, but move to Cañon City; now what we've done, we've said go to Pueblo West.

"I don't mean to make it sound negative, but as a citizen, and not as an employee of the school district, I do find this disappointing."

Horne said people told him that if the issues didn't pass, they would have to re-evaluate whether or not they would want their business in Fremont County.

"Now those people are going to have to ask tough questions," he said.

He said he is happy Issue 1A passed for the Fremont County Sheriff's Office, but he also wishes the community would have seen the bigger picture as far as education.

"This had nothing to do with Amendment 66, this was local people affecting local schools with local dollars," he said. "The money would not have gone anywhere else."

He said the loss it a "big blow," and Gooldy and the board will have some tough decisions to make.

"I hope the community understands - people were very upset with some of the decisions that happened in May (2012)," he said. "There may be some tough decisions coming down the pipe, and it's one the community is going to have to accept."

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